


Past That Icy River

by Lassarina



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 11:10:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13212513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lassarina/pseuds/Lassarina
Summary: She has never been so cold.Aerith finds Zack in the Lifestream.





	Past That Icy River

The water that rises up to meet her is warm and silky against her skin, and she has never been so cold.

Aerith had always thought that death would be warm; her mother had told her that the Planet welcomes all its children back to its embrace. She had thought the Lifestream would feel like the ocean in Costa del Sol: a powerful current, yes, pulling her into itself, but not this wintertime mountain river, tearing her away.

The Planet had whispered to her, told her what would happen, when she knelt to pray. It wasn't that she wanted to die; it was that she understood that there were more important things than her one life, against the weight of millions or billions.

She still didn't think it was fair that it had to _hurt._

A warm hand reached out and clasped hers, and pulled her free of the Lifestream. She gasped as she came free, like a swimmer surfacing after too long holding her breath, and staggered on the shore, falling into the arms of her rescuer.

"I wasn't expecting you so soon," Zack says, with sorrow mixed into the welcome joy in his voice, and she can only fling her arms tight around him and squeeze until he gasps a laughing protest.

Still, he holds her in return, and she buries her nose in the curve where his neck meets his shoulder, and breathes deep. She loves Cloud, of course, and maybe it did start because he reminded her so much of Zack, but she's always loved Zack, too, and she doesn't see why both can't be true at the same time.

"I saw him," Zack says quietly, against her hair, and she shakes her head, presses closer, because she wants to feel _this_ now, wants to be _here_ now and not there. She's done her part there. Is it so much to be a little selfish now?

She knows the answer to that, though.

"I knew what I was doing," she says.

"Of course you did." Zack runs his hand gently over her hair. "Think they're gonna be okay without us?"

She knows who he's really asking about. "I think he will," she says. "I think he's starting to see who he is when he isn't trying to be you."

"That's good." Zack holds her close, his hands sweeping in long, gentle strokes over her back, as though to reassure himself that she's still here. Wherever _here_ is; her mother never told her about a place on the other side of the Lifestream, but it makes sense. Some people aren't ready to go back to the Planet when they go, and subsuming all that resentment would tax the Planet's resources at a time when it needs all of them to recover from the Mako drilling. So it throws them back out, to make their own way, until they're ready.

Until the Planet doesn't need them anymore, and that's really it, isn't it? Zack was never a guy to dwell; he would have moved on years ago.

She looks up at him, and he bends to kiss her softly.

"We aren't done, are we?" she asks, her voice husky, when they pull apart.

"Guess not," he says. "But I don't know what the Planet wants from us."

"We'll know soon enough." She slips her hand into his, and squeezes. "In the meantime, I think we've got some catching up to do."

He smiles, and her heart fills with warmth, washing away the last icy grip of the Lifestream.


End file.
